Last time I came to the City, I was sad, bored and restless. This time the City is my friend. Everywhere I turn a smile comes back to me. Friday night I went to Pier 1 (not the store) with Chris for a dj & drum combo. We danced. I felt like I was with my people, beautiful men and women to dance with, bare feet, sore feet, bricks and boards. I couldn't stop dancing for three-and-a-half hours.One woman looked so familiar, like an old friend, like Libby in Austin who turned me onto Body Choir. I wanted to approach her, wanted to ask her if she knows Libby, wanted to ask her if she was an incarnation of Libby, even if she was somebody else. And she was.
We talked after the dance. She asked me if I dance 5Rhythms, and I told her I haven't but I want to (and I was familiar with it because Body Choir came out of 5Rhythms), so she gave me the info, her info. We connected further and today was Tuesday -- even though it's not Tuesday anymore -- and that was the first 5Rhythms I went to. But there's more before that.
Saturday I met Chris and Suzanne (and later Kyle) at the Cowgirl Hall of Fame for brunch. Just like old times, being with Chris and Suzanne (my two longest NYC acquaintances), and being at that restaurant because we used to have parties there, birthday parties and Y'all parties. Those were the days, and these are new days. And there was a lot of time between then and now.
After brunch we walked to Chris' office -- Suzanne & Kyle are buying an apartment through her -- then Suzanne & Kyle and I went to MoMA for the last forty-five minutes it was open to walk through the huge, amazing Richard Serra sculptures.
I saw the boy from the subway of a day or so earlier, but he didn't see me, he didn't care to see me; he didn't need to see me, it was my thing and not his.
Then I went to The Job and worked for a few hours. I thought I'd go home and hang out with the cat and get high and chill in front of the TV and eat Chinese food (Tim was out of town for the weekend). I did all of those things but didn't enjoy myself too much because Tim has the Parental Guide set on most of his TV channels so I "got stuck" watching two bad shows -- "1 vs. 100" and "The Surreal Life" with Tammy Faye Baker, Ron Jeremy, Gary Coleman, Vanilla Ice, the Hispanic guy from "CHiPs," and some other unknown "has-been" celebrities -- I couldn't decide which was worse, and I couldn't pull myself away from it till just after midnight. It's like I was trying to get entertainment but wasn't, so I was watching and watching and waiting for something that never came.
Sunday morning I ate at the neighborhood diner then went to work for a while.
Also on Saturday, on the way to Cowgirl, I stepped into the Gay & Lesbian (etc.) Community Center and picked up a couple of bar rags; I need the listings for reference, and decided that perhaps I would go to a fetish club or two (for research), one of which (a men's spiritual-sounding massage group called Touch) was in Brooklyn on Sunday night.
I had early dinner plans with another Chris, this one a Christine, on Sunday. She lives in Williamsburg, next to what used to be L Cafe...more memories of a fun performance space in the early years of Y'all. It's no longer there. But the memories are. We ate at a French restaurant called Juliette, which made me think of Florida -- not the restaurant or the food...the name. Ah, more memories. I met Christine's Brussels Griffon Valencia, which I tried to talk her out of getting a couple of years ago (pure bred dogs...). She's a cute dog and Christine is crazy about her.
She's also crazy about handbags.
Monday, work, then Ethan's meditation group at Lila Yoga Center on Houston and Bowery. I stopped meditating around the time I came to NYC the last time, didn't see Ethan, that could've been part of the problem.
Oh, and I went home after Christine's, didn't feel like Touch, wanted to do laundry instead, which I did, but the super locked the basement fifteen minutes early so I had to get my clothes on Monday morning. Tim and I watched some TV together (he has the password). We saw an amazing campaign for HBO called "Voyeur." Eight apartments with the outside wall "removed" (or missing, perhaps) with eight four-minute scenes going on in them, some of them overlapping, most not. We watched the whole set of eight (which apparently were projected on the outside of an actual building in the City as part of the campaign and perhaps they still are) then we watched the others in sets of two. Pretty cool.
Monday's meditation topic was Anger. I took a personal vow to meditate every day for the next seven. So far so good.
After the group I made my way to the Eagle for the Foot Friends' weekly gathering. I met a guy named Morris, cute, my age (surprisingly). I asked him if he liked feet particularly. He said, "I don't know, they're okay. I mean, I guess. Sure." I said, "Me, too." We made out a bit, played footsie. It was a strange but nice connection. We may get together again.
Today is Tuesday (or was). Work was frustrating. I'm training for a new aspect of my job. Learning new, unfamiliar things (particularly having to do with computers) is frustrating.
Fortunately, I had 5Rhythms to go to. It's not totally Body Choir, but there's enough of a resemblance that I felt at home. My new friend Stephanie was there as were other people from the Friday night dance on the pier. Gabrielle Roth, the creator of 5Rhythms, led the class. It was more of a class than Body Choir. It was also $20, which I gulped at, but it was worth it. Gabrielle did a very inspiring talk, explained the five rhythms (flowing, staccato, chaos, lyrical, stillness) of the dance, and led us through a guided dance with a live percussion group. It's a bit fresh and recent to really justify with description right now.
Stephanie encouraged me to hang around after and go eat with them at a nearby restaurant. I went with a couple of other folks and Stephanie didn't show up, but it was a very nice dinner, lovely friends, a dozen or so.
Now the long train ride home, which is coming to an end. I have had to take the A to 168th Street and transfer every night; it adds considerable time to my trip.
